Installing GLaDOS in the ceiling of your house

Install this light fixture in your bedroom and you might kiss your nights of peaceful sleep goodbye. Fans of the Portal game franchise will recognize it as a smaller version of the megalomaniacal artificial intelligence character from the game. This particular rendition is how she looked in the second installment of the series. The lamp is the creation of [Dragonator]. It was entirely 3D printed before being outfitted with LEDs to actually function as a light.

Our first thought is that this project is all about 3D design to get the final product t0 look so fantastic. But if you dig a little deeper you’ll see that it’s so much more than that. To get pieces that look this fantastic you must have a well tuned printer and be willing to let it run for 40-60 hours as it burns through 2 kg of filament. At that point you’re still far from the finish line as the [Dragonator] then set to work sanding and painting all of the pieces. From there he lovingly assembled everything, including gears and motors to give it motion.

In the end the electronics did not work as he envisioned. But maybe after a bit of time off from all that work he’ll revisit the project and make a bit more progress. For us, the aesthetic already makes the hack. Making it move and sound like the character would be over the top.

Install a pico projector, take clips from the game, put in a motion sensor and the whenever someone walks into the room it would beam images and sound clips from the game onto the unsuspecting persons face. One rendering the person temporarily blinded and Two heaving insults at them while they stand there stunned like a deer in headlights. Awesome creation!

I have a couple of issues with this guy.
1. He wont post videos of the unit or work on the unit to get it to work better until the instructables UP contest is finished and he wins one of the printers.
2. He wont post the STL files until the contest is finished
3. It doesnt work

What is slightly worrying is the way in which it doesn’t work that hasn’t been troubleshot

“When I finally figure out how to make this thing moving without all the electronics heating up to 100°C, you will be the first to know.”

That seems like quite a serious problem to overcome if it’s more complicated than just checking the wiring. I could understand if it were localised i.e. the motor driver or something, but *all* the electronics?

He won’t post videos because it doesn’t actually move yet; and he’s posted STLs, just not the original Solidworks files. The manipulation to try to win the contest is a bit odious, but he doesn’t really owe the community anything. Someone else will update this and get it working even if he doesn’t. (me?)

Isn’t ethics the owing of each individual to the community? Funny how people that are willing to bend ethics say they do not owe anyone anything, as if to almost entirely but not quite admit that they are without any conscience.